Born Hurting: Tennessee's struggle with addicted mothers and their babies.

[magical thyme]

Very good and worthwhile read. Note that the opening paragraphs at the link are pretty gut-wrenching.

...In the past decade, the number of babies in withdrawal has increased tenfold. Last year, 921 drug-dependent babies were born in the state.

The average cost to deliver a drug-dependent baby is $62,000, compared with $4,700 for a healthy child. Taxpayers bear the brunt of this cost — most of these babies and their mothers are on TennCare, the state's health insurance program for the poor.

Last year, legislators passed a law designed to encourage mothers with addiction to seek treatment. Called the Safe Harbor Act, the law says that if addicted mothers seek help, the Department of Children's Services cannot take their children into state custody based on the addiction alone.

But this year the legislature passed another law, one that tagged mothers with addiction as perpetrators of crimes against infants. As of July 1, police will be able to arrest a woman whose baby tests positive for drugs if she can't prove she's taking steps to get clean.

http://www.tennessean.com/longform/news/investigations/2014/06/13/drug-dependent-babies-challenge-doctors-politicians/10112813/

It seems that what they're saying is voluntarily seek help, and you won't be prosecuted. Don't seek help and you will be.

The problem is they don't have enough facilities for the sheer numbers. Refusing Medicaid expansion certainly didn't help their situation. They should be taking all the help they can get.